


Reflections

by radiofreekerberos



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Keith (Voltron) Whump, M/M, Pining Keith (Voltron), Pining Shiro (Voltron), Protective Krolia (Voltron), Protective Shiro (Voltron), SHEITH - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-09
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-06-07 13:59:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15220682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/radiofreekerberos/pseuds/radiofreekerberos
Summary: His eyes slide to the tangle of bandages swathing what’s left of his shoulder. He remembers the look of horror on Keith’s face when the tech expanded like glowing tendrils beneath his burning flesh and devoured his shoulder in a relentless wave of transforming machinery. It doesn’t matter that it hadn’t technically been Shiro’s flesh at the time. He still remembers how it felt; like live-wires melting him from the inside out. He never wants to find out what was supposed to happen next.or, the one where Shiro wakes up with two sets of memories and a whole lot of feelings for Keith





	Reflections

Sleep releases Shiro reluctantly from its embrace. His sluggish eyes slide open in unfamiliar territory to muted darkness and a bed that isn’t his. Something’s humming. He stares at the vents above his head blowing recycled air into the room and listens to himself breathing, counting each rhythmic rise and fall of his chest. There’s a vague gnawing in the pit of his stomach. Maybe it’s hunger. He tries to remember what hunger felt like. He swallows, memorizing the sensation, and scrubs his face. It feels like his face. Same nose as far as he can tell, same patch of puckered skin covering it. Same solid chin. He scratches the patchy stubble covering his face. Itchy. He remembers itchy. He stares at the Snow White hair falling into his eyes. It seems longer. He purses his lips and idly blows it aside. He should get up, but he’s having trouble summoning the energy. He feels heavy. He’d forgotten how heavy a flesh and blood body was. He’ll get used to it. Just like he always does. Everything becomes normal if you live with it long enough. Even wearing a body you weren’t born wearing. 

His eyes slide to the tangle of bandages swathing what’s left of his shoulder. He remembers the look of horror on Keith’s face when the tech expanded like glowing tendrils beneath his burning flesh and devoured his shoulder in a relentless wave of transforming machinery. It doesn’t matter that it hadn’t technically been Shiro’s flesh at the time. He still remembers how it felt; like live-wires melting him from the inside out. He never wants to find out what was supposed to happen next. 

He grunts and sits up. It’s not that easy to do one handed, especially since the bed he’s laying in is soft and round and sort of sunken, like a nest. There are no blankets, but several plush pillows are piled around him. He thinks it might be a Blade bed. He seems to recall Krolia mentioning something about a remote base where they could go to rest and recover before beginning the long journey home.

“You’re awake,” someone says from the shadows and Shiro startles for a moment before he recognizes the voice.

“Krolia,” he murmurs, his voice rough with sleep. “I didn’t see you there.”

Krolia detaches herself from the rest of the dark like a living shadow and stealthily moves towards the bed. Pale blue light suffuses the room at the movement, illuminating her face. The look on it is so like Keith’s, it makes Shiro’s heart ache. “How long was I out? he asks.

“Nearly three quintents,” she says. “How’re you feeling?”

Shiro shrugs and rubs his gritty eyes. “A little… weird actually,” he says, staring at his remaining hand. It’s so big. Was it always this big? The fingers are long and thick. He thinks about all that muscle he put on in the arena, but that was his original body. He earned those muscles naturally if painfully. This body was grown in a lab. How’d it get so big? Druid magic? Some sort of space-steroids?

“Give it time,” Krolia tells him, and Shiro frowns slightly. Time… to learn how to live with all the new things that will keep him up at night. 

“Where’s Keith?” he asks. 

Shiro remembers Keith being there the last time he opened his eyes, hunched over the bed with a glowing space-wolf curled at his feet. He remembers staring at the blistered welt marring Keith’s cheek and the livid purple bruises standing out all over his face and jaw. Keith smiled at him, though the hollows of his eyes had been deeply creased with fatigue and his cheeks were flushed, as if he’d been running a fever. Shiro desperately wanted to tell him how sorry he was, but he’d been so tired. He’d drifted off again before he could form the words.

“Coran gave him something to help him sleep,” Krolia says in that tone seemingly shared by mothers throughout the galaxy. 

“Is he alright?” Shiro asks, even though he knows he isn’t. He gave Keith a pounding, or not him exactly, but Shiro remembers each and every blow as if it had been delivered by him personally, which is enough to make him feel responsible and practically eat him alive with guilt. 

Krolia’s jaw clenches slightly as if she’s considering how much to tell him. Maybe she’s trying to spare his feelings, or maybe Keith asked her not to reveal too much. “His wound was troubling him,” she says mildly, though the tension in her jaw and shoulders reveals how worried she is. It’s obvious to Shiro that she’d much rather be with her son right now than here with him, but Shiro expects they couldn’t get Keith to agree to leave him otherwise.

“I want to see him,” Shiro says. He struggles to pull himself free of the bed, but it’s like trying to escape the most comfortable chair in the world with one arm tied behind his back. Which he supposes is something he’ll have to get used to from now on, doing things one handed. At least until he’s ready to have alien tech fused to his body again. If he’s ever ready. 

Krolia grabs his hand and helps him to his feet. “ I don’t suppose there’s anything I can say to dissuade you,” she says flatly. 

“Not really, no,” Shiro says. Someone’s dressed him in the sweats he usually wears to bed. He takes a few wobbly steps, trying to remember how walking works. It comes back to him fairly quickly. Apparently having a slightly used body can come in handy at times, Shiro supposes there’s something to be said for muscle memory. “Look I promise I won’t disturb him. I’d just… like to be there when he wakes up.”

“Are you really sure that’s a good idea,” Krolia says softly. For Shiro's face to be the first one Keith sees she means, the face that tried to kill him.

“Honestly, I don’t know,” Shiro admits. “I just know there are things left unsaid between us, and I need them not to be.”

Krolia sighs explosively. She crosses her arms over her chest and regards him with a look that seems to hover somewhere between cautious affection and outright distrust. “I know I owe you a debt, Shiro,” she says. “You were there for Keith when I couldn’t be. You believed in him when no one else did. I will always be grateful to you for that,” Shiro senses there’s a ‘but’ coming, “but I know Keith has given you his heart,” she says, involuntarily straightening to her full height, “He hasn’t even realized it himself yet, but it’s not something he does easily.” She pauses for a moment to glare at him. “Do not break it.”

She’s taller than Shiro and fairly intimidating and Shiro nearly smiles because he gets it now. It’s the _hurt my son and I will end you_ speech, and this is exactly what he wants for Keith. He wants Keith to have a mother who will love him fiercely and unconditionally and want to keep him from harm, and if that means Shiro has to keep proving himself to her, well then so be it.

“You don’t owe me anything Krolia,” Shiro says quietly. “Keith means…” _everything_ to me he’d been about to say, but he thinks he should probably tell Keith that before he tells anyone else. “It’s been my privilege to know him,” he says instead. “You have an amazing son, and it seems to me that anyone lucky enough to have his heart, would be a fool not to do everything in their power to make sure they’re worthy of keeping it.”

Shiro can tell she hasn’t quite made up her mind about him yet, though her face does soften somewhat. “He’s across the hall,” she finally concedes.

“Thank you,” Shiro says gratefully.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on the [tumblr](https://radiofreekerberos.tumblr.com/)


End file.
